Day: May 22, 2014

Minneapolis: Somalis want to expand mall, neighbors opposed

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I expect to see David Lubell and his “Welcoming America” gang stepping in here to support the Somali “entrepreneurs” who say business is booming in South Minneapolis and to get the minds right of these clearly “unwelcoming” neighbors.

Minneapolis Mayor Betsy Hodges donned a hijab to visit business leaders in South Minneapolis! http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2014/04/mayor-hodges-dons-the-hijab.php

 

However, here is what I don’t get, how does this notion that business is booming fit with the statistics we reported yesterday from Minnesota that 63% of Somalis in that state live below the poverty level.  Where are they getting the money then to shop and hang around to watch soccer and drink tea?

From the Minneapolis Star Tribune:

Local Somalis had high hopes for the expansion of a Somali mall in south Minneapolis, after the owner proposed adding nearly 9,000 square feet of space and expanding the parking lot.

But one by one, the mall’s neighbors showed up to testify at a Planning Commission meeting late Monday that the mall had already caused many traffic and parking problems in the area.

City planning commissioners voted down the expansion Monday night, calling on the developer to further study how it would affect traffic. City planners had supported the project.

The crowded mall is the latest example of a problem throughout the city: balancing the needs of neighborhood businesses with complaints that their customers overwhelm the streets.  [Do you have “customers” overwhelming the streets where you live?—ed]

Are they just hanging around with not much to do (on the taxpayers’ dime)?

Cars park where there are no designated spaces, often boxing each other in and sometimes even blocking the mall’s entrances as East African immigrants stream in to drink tea, watch soccer, log on to computers, have their hair cut, and buy dresses, scarves and rugs.

Here is what the neighbors say:

Many Somali immigrants stepped up to support the project before planning commissioners on Monday, but opponents said that Village Market, as the mall is known, was never designed to support so many visitors and businesses. It has invited noise, illegal parking, littering, crime, dangerous driving maneuvers and loud music. Some said they had seen ambulances struggle to weave through.

Hey, lucky Cheyenne, Wyoming!  This could be you someday!

Thank Catholic Charities, Lutheran Social Services and World Relief Minnesota for helping make this lovely situation possible in Minneapolis!

US State Department hiding stats on which US cities receive refugees

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Why is that?

For the longest time we were able to access statistics for cities at the US State Department contracted site called WRAPS (Worldwide Refugees Admissions Processing System/Refugee Processing Center (RPC)).

Most of the website is NOT available to the public, but at this public page there had been for years a link for ‘arrivals by destination city by nationality.’    I thought I might be imagining that there had been that statistical category, but noticed just now, when visiting another US State Department contracted site, that indeed it exists (but not for you!).

Here is what the Cultural Orientation Resource Center (gee I wonder when they turned the ‘C’ in their logo into a crescent?) says about the WRAPS/RPC stats:

The Refugee Processing Center (RPC), operated by the U.S Department of State, Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration (PRM), coordinates the processing and tracking of the movement of refugees from various countries around the world to the U.S. for resettlement under the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program.

Working closely with Resettlement Support Centers, national refugee resettlement agencies, and others, the RPC oversees the use of an interactive computer system called the Worldwide Refugee Admissions Processing System (WRAPS). The RPC uses this data to produce a variety of reports on refugee arrivals per region within a fiscal year, arrivals by state within a fiscal year, arrivals by destination city by nationality, and so on.

To access these reports and more, see the Refugee Processing Center’s Admissions and Arrivals reports page.

What else do they keep from the public?  They keep the stats on the number of Muslims, Christians, Buddhists, Hindus etc. that are coming in as refugees, but do not release those to the public either.  Only special people can get further into the password-protected site.  It is all part of the secrecy that is a hallmark of the program.

See a list of State Department “preferred communities,” here.  But, we don’t know how many and what nationalities are being resettled. Is your city one of them?

Don’t forget!  Please send a comment to the US State Department by May 29th (one week from today!) on the “size and scope” of refugee admissions for FY 2015!

90,000 Bhutanese from Nepal resettled in the West since 2007…

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

…..and they are not done!

The US has taken 75,000 of those and more are on the way.

The UN and the International Organization for Migration say that 21,000 more have expressed interest in coming to your city.

The Bhutanese are really from Nepal originally and were sent packing from Bhutan when that country wanted to keep Bhutan for its own people.  Nepal didn’t want its people back, so what the heck, we lined up to take them.  And, readers, remember! it was the Bush Administration that opened the pipeline.  Bush said 60,000 (of the 100,000) over five years was our limit!

Before we get to the short news story, please look at this map of the camps in Nepal.

When you tally up the number of residents in each camp in 2007 the total number comes to 107,700, yet this article tells us that the total number (resettled 90,000 and waiting 27,000) is closer to 10,000 more.  Either they were cranking out babies or other “refugees” (having heard the good news) have come to the camps since 2007 looking for a ticket out!

http://www.culturalorientation.net/providing-orientation/overseas/programs/rsc-south-asia/images/map-of-bhutanese-refugee-camps-in-eastern-nepal

Here is The Himalayan (90‚000 refugees from Bhutan resettled: IOM)

The resettlement of the Bhutanese refugees began in 2007. So far, over 5,800 refugees from Bhutan have been resettled in several communities across Canada, including Charlottetown, Saint-Jérôme, Quebec City, Ottawa, Toronto, Vancouver, among others. The other resettlement countries are Australia, Denmark, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The majority of resettled refugees – over 75,000 – have been taken in by the United States, the statement read.

“This is another important step towards resolving one of the most protracted refugee situations in Asia. This has been possible due to the strong support of the Government of Nepal and the excellent cooperation between the resettlement countries, UNHCR and IOM…..   [LOL!  I bet there was strong support from Nepal—they didn’t want their people back.  But, I still wonder why that was our (US) concern? Cheap labor?—ed]

[….]

According to IOM, of the 27,000 refugees remaining in the camps, about 21,000 have already expressed an interest in resettlement and are expected to depart in the coming years.

What is the lesson here?  Don’t believe the US State Department the next time they say we are only taking ____ refugees.  For example, once the doors are opened wide to Syrians there will be no end in sight!

Click here for our extensive Bhutanese refugee archive.